The Celsius Scale

Celsius,
also known as centigrade, is a scale and unit of measurement for temperature, named after the Swedish astronomer Anders Celsius (1701–1744),
who developed a similar scale. The degree Celsius (°C) can refer to a specific temperature on the Celsius scale as well
as a unit to indicate a temperature interval, a difference between two temperatures or an uncertainty. The unit was known until 1948
as "centigrade" from the Latin centum translated as 100 and gradus translated as "steps".

From 1744 until 1954, 0 °C was defined as the freezing point of water and 100 °C was defined as the boiling point of water, both at a
pressure of one standard atmosphere with mercury being the working material. Although this is commonly taught in
schools today, by international agreement the unit "degree Celsius" and the Celsius scale are currently defined by two different temperatures:
absolute zero; and the triple point of VSMOW (specially purified water).

This definition also precisely relates the Celsius scale to the Kelvin scale, which defines the SI base unit of thermodynamic temperature with symbol K.
Absolute zero, the lowest temperature possible at which matter theoretically would reach minimum entropy, is defined as being precisely 0 K and −273.15 °C.
The temperature of the triple point of water is defined as precisely 273.16 K and 0.01 °C.

The Delisle Scale

The Delisle scale (°De) is a temperature scale invented in 1732 by the French astronomer
Joseph-Nicolas Delisle (1688–1768).
In 1732, Delisle built a thermometer that used mercury as a working fluid. Delisle chose his scale using the temperature of
boiling water as the fixed zero point and measured the contraction of the mercury (with lower temperatures) in hundred-thousandths.
Delisle thermometers usually had 2400 or 2700 graduations.

In 1738 Josias Weitbrecht (1702–47) recalibrated the Delisle thermometer
with two fixed points, keeping 0 degrees as the boiling point and adding 150 degrees as the freezing point of water. He then sent this calibrated
thermometer to various scholars, including Anders Celsius. The Celsius scale,
like the Delisle scale, originally ran from zero for boiling water down to 100 for freezing water. This was reversed to its modern order after his death,
in part at the instigation of Swedish botanist Carolus Linnaeus
and the manufacturer of Linnaeus thermometers, Daniel Ekström. The Delisle thermometer remained in use in Russia for almost 100 years.

The Fahrenheit Scale

Fahrenheit (°F) is a temperature scale based on one proposed in 1724 by the German physicist
Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit (1686–1736), after whom it is named.
On Fahrenheit's original scale the lower defining point was the lowest temperature to which he could reproducibly cool brine (defining 0 degrees),
while the highest was that of the average human core body temperature (defining 100 degrees).

There exist several stories on the exact original definition of his scale; however, some of the specifics have been presumed lost or exaggerated
with time. The scale is now usually defined by two fixed points: the temperature at which water freezes into ice is defined as 32 degrees,
and the boiling point of water is defined to be 212 degrees, a 180-degree separation, as defined at sea level and standard atmospheric pressure.

The Rankine scale is based on the Fahrenheit scale,
with its zero representing absolute zero instead.

The Kelvin Scale

The Kelvin (°K) scale is named after the Belfast-born, Glasgow University engineer and physicist
William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin (1824–1907),
who wrote of the need for an "absolute thermometric scale." It is an absolute, thermodynamic temperature scale, using as its null point
absolute zero, the temperature at which all thermal motion ceases in the classical description of thermodynamics.

The kelvin is defined as 1/273.16 of the thermodynamic temperature of the triple point of water (exactly 0.01 °C or 32.018 °F); i.e.,
it is defined such that the triple point of water is exactly 273.16 K.

The kelvin is the primary unit of measurement in the physical sciences, but is often used in conjunction with the degree Celsius,
which has the same magnitude. Subtracting 273.16 K from the temperature of the triple point of water (0.01 °C) makes absolute zero (0 K)
equivalent to −273.15 °C (−459.67 °F).

The Rankine Scale

Rankine (°R, or °Ra to distinguish it from the
Réaumur or
Rømer scales)
is a thermodynamic (absolute) temperature scale named after the Glasgow University engineer and physicist
William John Macquorn Rankine, who proposed it in 1859.
(The Kelvin scale was first proposed in 1848.)

By analogy with Kelvin, some authors call the unit rankine, omitting the degree symbol. Zero on both the Kelvin and Rankine scales
is absolute zero, but the Rankine degree is defined as equal to one degree Fahrenheit, rather than the one degree Celsius used by the
Kelvin scale. A temperature of −459.67 °F is exactly equal to 0 °R.

Some engineering fields in the United States measure thermodynamic temperature using the Rankine scale.
The US National Institute of Standards and Technology recommends not using degrees Rankine in NIST publications.

The Réaumur Scale

Réaumur (°R, or °Ré to distinguish it from the
Rankine or
Rømer scales)
is a temperature scale in which the freezing and boiling points of water are set to 0 and 80 degrees respectively. The scale is named after
René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur,
who first proposed something similar in 1730.

The Réaumur scale saw widespread use in Europe, particularly in France and Germany as well as Russia, as referenced in works of
Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, and Nabokov. By the 1790s, France chose the Celsius scale for the metric system over the Réaumur measurements,
but it was used in some parts of Europe until at least the mid-19th century.

Its only modern use is in the measuring of milk temperature in cheese production. It is used in some Italian dairies making
Parmigiano-Reggiano and Grana Padano cheeses and in Swiss Alp cheeses. In the Netherlands the Réaumur thermometer is used when
cooking sugar syrup for desserts and sweets.

The Rømer Scale

The Rømer (also Roemer) temperature scale (°R, or °Rø to distinguish it from the
Rankine or
Réaumur scales),
is named after the Danish astronomer
Ole Christensen Rømer, who proposed it in 1701.

Zero was initially set using freezing brine, and the boiling point of water was defined as 60 degrees. Rømer then saw that the
freezing point of pure water was roughly one eighth of the way (about 7.5 degrees) between these two points, so he redefined the lower
fixed point to be the freezing point of water at precisely 7.5 degrees. This did not greatly change the scale but made it easier to calibrate
by defining it by reference to pure water. Thus the unit of this scale, a Rømer degree, is 100/52.5 = 40/21 of a kelvin (or of a Celsius degree).

The Rømer scale is no longer in use but is of some historical importance. Alongside the
Newton scale, it was the first calibrated scale.
Previous thermometers gave only an indication of whether the temperature was rising or falling, or else were highly inaccurate.
For instance the top and bottom marks of thermometers were typically set to the hottest and coldest days respectively of the current year
which clearly would vary from year to year. The idea of using two fiduciary points with equally spaced calibration marks between them was completely new.

Website Development - Florida Atlantic University

Lifelong Learning's First Site

In my first summer at FAU I taught myself HTML and CSS and put up a 100-page site for the Lifelong Learning Program. Someone else is maintaining it now, but much of the site is still my work.

Online Registration

The following summer, I hired and worked closely with a programmer to create their first online registration system. We designed, coded and launched the system in 13 weeks. It was an immediate success – 40% of student enrollment is now online, impressive given that the students are all senior citizens.

Honors College Site

In my last three months at FAU I completely redesigned the Jupiter Honors College site – about 350 pages plus images, graphics, forms and tables, again all hand-coded HTML and CSS. I improved the navigation and organization, reduced the page count by over 50% using two-column design and tabs, and put up 250+ images.

Sample Pages

Academics – Added faculty e-mail links, two-toned tables that are easier to read, and used two column design to improve organization and reduce scrolling.
Compare old and new pages.

Beyond the Campus – Combined three old pages into one new page, added the links, and created all new images.
Compare old and new pages.

Application Form – Aligned & organized the data entry boxes, reduced scrolling, and added color and text emphasis.
Compare old and new pages.

Desktop Publishing

InDesign

I created three catalogs each year for FAU's Lifelong Learning Program, Using InDesign. 10,000 copies were printed each semester, and I posted the catalog online as well. Click here to view one of the catalogs.

The catalogs had class registration forms for students to complete and fax in. I completely redesigned the form, a fun challenge since it had to be easy to fill out, fit a lot of information onto a single page (to allow for faxing), and still be legible when faxed.

Photoshop

Each catalog also had ad pages, which I created with Photoshop. Ad sales more than paid for the cost of printing the catalog (click images to enlarge).

Technical Writing

Intel Product Manual

I’ve written a lot of documentation, web content and white papers, including the manual for the Intel Smart Video Recorder III, a PC add-in board for video capture and compression designed to enhance the value of Intel's Indeo® Video technology.

The manual was challenging in that video capture required a lot of know-how, but the ISVR III sold for a very affordable $199. So the manual had to convey a lot of technical information and yet be useful to both professionals and novices, who could for the first time afford such a professional-level product.

I wrote all of the text, did hours of testing to generate data, and created the screen shots, charts and tables. The product won numerous Editor's Choice awards, and Intel sold over 100,000 of the boards. The technology was also the basis for a consumer webcam product.